


Gravity

by prodigy



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: BDSM, M/M, Nohr | Conquest Route
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-27
Updated: 2017-06-27
Packaged: 2018-11-19 15:41:37
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11316477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prodigy/pseuds/prodigy
Summary: What Saizo doesn't learn from a lifetime with Ryoma and what he does.





	Gravity

Afterwards Lord Ryoma read aloud to him. It wasn't something Saizo had been expecting. In his mind, envisioning this for the thousandth time, he had always imagined he would dress and Lord Ryoma would dismiss him, and he would resume his duties on guard for the night. Now, though, he could feel his legs shake when he sat up. His body felt wrung-out and weak. It embarrassed him. He hadn't expected it either. Lord Ryoma stood and donned a robe and went to get a pitcher from the table-- "I," Saizo began, but Lord Ryoma shook his head and smiled and poured into a cup, and came back and proffered it until Saizo took a long sip. When he finished the water, Lord Ryoma set it aside and guided Saizo to lie down again with his head in his lap, his hand in Saizo's hair.

"You're so good," he said, not for the first time. "I'm so proud of you."

Saizo shut his eyes, letting the flush of contentment overtake him. But Lord Ryoma wasn't finished: "How are you feeling?" he said and nudged Saizo's chin to indicate that he should look up. Something rote and unhelpful came to mind, but glancing up at Lord Ryoma he could see there was a certain expression on his face: a fond intensity that said, _answer me truthfully_. So he considered what to say. He wasn't sure. There weren't many words in Saizo's language for moments like this.

"A bit," he said after a moment. "Tired. But I'll be fine. If you want me to go--" He didn't so much break off as trail off, aware of the weight of Lord Ryoma's regard.

Lord Ryoma's thumb passed over his hairline. "Do I seem like I want you to go?" he said gently.

Saizo went silent, chastened. Lord Ryoma leaned down and kissed him on the top of the head, perhaps to indicate a lack of displeasure--though Saizo was hardly going to assume--and he said, again, "You did so well." After a time he took a book from the side-table and opened it. It was a volume of poetry Saizo had seen before; to Saizo, Lord Ryoma's books were interchangeable, but he recognized them by color and binding, and this one Lord Ryoma favored more than the others. Saizo thought he remembered him having it copied out once as a present for Lady Sakura.

" _I have lost my way_ ," Lord Ryoma read, " _among the fields of autumn._ "

Saizo was still and tried to listen. Or rather, he tried to understand: he had always been good at _listening_ , all his life, but in some aspects of Lord Ryoma's life true comprehension escaped him. Kaze, irritated, had once accused him of being dismissive of art; of course, this was when they were twelve, but Saizo remembered this kind of thing because even at twelve he'd known that Lord Ryoma took an interest in such things. Ever since he had tried to train his attention.

" _Over yonder, where pine-crickets say 'we're waiting'_ \--" Saizo settled into the rhythm of Lord Ryoma's voice, but for once his mind wandered entirely: to his own positioning in Lord Ryoma's lap, to where they were located in the room, and the situation of the room within the palace, under the sky, and the strangeness of it all. The discomfort wasn't fading, but he was getting used to it; outside, in harmony with the text, crickets had indeed struck up a chorus. He wondered what he was supposed to do next.

* * *

He was sure Kaze knew. Kaze knew everything about him, Saizo was faintly certain, though he would never articulate this in any terms to his brother. More troubling was the prospect that Kaze didn't know and would find out, or guess: though Saizo was mortified by the prospect of explaining himself, perceiving Kaze's trajectory from confusion to understanding was worse. He decided he would not think about it or him, and that was the end of it.

They sparred the next morning, when Saizo was still a little unsteady on his feet. The result was victory on Kaze's part, which he carried off with a grin and only a glint of smugness--the wider world would probably be flabbergasted to know that Kaze could be smug at all, but the wider world wasn't related to him. It was easier than sparring with Kagero, anyway; everything became a contest with Kagero, past a certain point, and Saizo didn't want to deal with that. When Kaze had him flat on his back, Saizo brought his hands up in implicit surrender. "You're improving," he said.

"You make it sound like it's the first time I've beaten you," said Kaze. He offered Saizo a hand up.

Saizo took it and didn't deign to reply. He brushed past Kaze and went to wash his face in the basin, unhooking his mask long enough to do so. He had been loath to take it off since Lord Ryoma had given his order: _as long as we're alone together, I would look upon your face, Saizo the Fifth._ It now felt like a privilege reserved for him. But the reality was that Kaze and Kagero well knew what he looked like, and there was no use in pretending otherwise.

"You know, I'm glad we switched to doing this in the morning," Kaze was saying conversationally. "It's a good pick-me-up. But sometimes I think we get too tired at night this way--"

Saizo replaced his mask and glanced at him, as if to say, _maybe you_. Kaze shrugged. "Maybe every other day?" he suggested.

"No," said Saizo.

"Oh, well." Kaze buckled his bracers back on and turned his back. "Is Lord Ryoma faring well? I haven't seen him in a few days."

Saizo's composure only needed an instant, and Kaze took longer than that to glance back at him. By then Saizo had settled his mouth into an indifferent line under his mask, and his eyebrows knit together as usual; "He's well," he said. "You have border reconnaissance tomorrow. You should focus on that."

"You don't need to worry about me," said Kaze.

"I'm not." It was a lie Saizo was used to pronouncing, and gave without a second thought. He turned and walked away; he supposed, at the time, that Kaze was the last person he needed to present his everyday goodbyes.

* * *

Fantasy had always had him on his knees. In reality, he spent most of his time in seiza in Lord Ryoma's company: that was how Lord Ryoma preferred to see his obedience while they conversed, and Saizo was more than accustomed and content to accommodate. In the bedchamber Lord Ryoma liked him on his back--that was how he taught Saizo to take him, initially, and he had Saizo more often that way than any other, though Saizo learned on his hands and knees as well, and braced in Lord Ryoma's lap, which he found the most difficult. But Lord Ryoma was gentle; Lord Ryoma was patient; and Saizo breathed in and out, as he was told, and they touched foreheads.

Fantasy hadn't filled in much more, either, beyond Lord Ryoma taking him as a lover; it hadn't presumed. But afterward, every time, Lord Ryoma brought Saizo's head to rest on his shoulder and spoke to him. Spoke _with_ him, rather: that was the novel thing, the answers that Lord Ryoma brought out of him, first halting and then less so.

Lord Ryoma would say: _How is your brother?_ And Saizo would answer, reflexively, _Well enough, Lord Ryoma_ \--and then it would occur to him that Lord Ryoma was looking for an answer, and he would have to think about it. It was something he thought of often, but not generally in the context of Lord Ryoma's curiosity. _He's restless. He wants to contribute to the war effort, but I think he's always thought he'd be better placed as a retainer. Maybe he would._ Saizo would hesitate. _I don't mean --_

 _I understand._ Here Lord Ryoma stroked his hair and waited for him to continue. When Saizo didn't, he said, placidly, _Mine is restless as well. I suppose it's in his nature._

_Lord Takumi is young._

Lord Ryoma looked amused, to Saizo's general puzzlement. _Yes. He is that. But I think it's also in his nature. It certainly was in mine._

That was not how Saizo remembered it. In his estimation, Lord Ryoma had never been impetuous, exactly: eager, maybe, when he was younger, but not that. (Saizo had a particular dislike for the word _impetuous_ \--his father had not-infrequently applied it to him, while he was still alive, and Kaze had a tendency to take it up in rare quarrels. It didn't match with Saizo's self-concept.) Still, he didn't consider it--then--his place to disagree. His disagreement must have shown in his breath, though, or the set of his shoulders, because Lord Ryoma smiled and said, _You don't believe me, Saizo?_

 _I remember you_ , said Saizo simply.

 _Your memory_ , Lord Ryoma teased, _is imperfect. As is your lord._

There was a great deal of warmth between their bodies. Saizo stirred. _I should relieve Kagero._

 _Mm. She'll know when to go to bed._ Lord Ryoma curled his arm around him. _Stay here._

* * *

Things were no frostier with Kagero, in fact, contrary to Saizo's primary fears; but they were different. If there was no concealing anything from Kaze, there was no even considering privacy with Kagero, Kagero who spent half her waking time in Lord Ryoma's company and the other half in Saizo's. If she had an opinion on this development, she kept it to herself. Saizo was aware that insight into anyone's heart--even Kagero's--was not a particular gift he had, but even beyond that he had a curiously difficult time imagining what Kagero would make of this. She still kept to herself, in her off time, entertaining Orochi's company sometimes but largely her own. She and Saizo were not in the habit of spending optional time together any more. There was no need.

Once when they were waiting together, Kagero had brought along some charcoal to sketch with, and angled the paper away from Saizo; Saizo, in what he supposed was vanity, imagined that she was drawing him. She'd certainly been given to it before. But when he caught a glimpse, it was Lord Ryoma's face, rendered in a few well-placed lines. He felt a stab of envy, along with suspicion. All she said was, "He looks a great deal like his father, doesn't he."

Saizo didn't answer. His mask provided a useful shield: underneath it, he pursed his lips in displeasure and looked away.

"I thought you would be happy that I was drawing something 'normal,'" Kagero observed.

 _When have I ever concerned myself with what you choose to draw?_ Saizo thought of saying, but decided that, itself, would be concerning itself a bit too much.

It ended up being Kagero, not Lord Ryoma, who delivered the news to him the following week. He was glad of that, shamefully. She didn't make anything out of it or try to be kind. She just found him and said, "Kaze's been taken by the Nohrians. There's no more news yet."

Saizo, who expected many terrible things out of fortune, had tried to rehearse something like this before in his mind. Rather, he'd rehearsed Kaze's death before. It hadn't occurred to him to prepare himself for this kind of horrible in-between. He turned away from Kagero to think, but in truth there was no expression to conceal from her; the news had filled him with a curious blankness. What did one say at a time like this? "He won't give them anything," he said eventually.

Kagero looked at him. "I don't suppose he would," she said.

There was always a distance between them--always had been, even before they'd gone their separate ways--but sometimes Saizo felt it a terrifying vastness. She saved him from having to look upon it, though, by gathering herself up and leaving. Then he had to report to Lord Ryoma about it, who had already heard; when he did, Lord Ryoma drew him into his quarters and put his arms around him.

"I'm sorry," said Lord Ryoma. He smelled like sweat, like he'd recently been practicing his kata. Dimly, Saizo regretted taking him from it. He found that his fingers were curling into Lord Ryoma's sleeves of their own accord.

* * *

He was given to silence, which meant that he was given to thinking: not deep, collected thought like he imagined Lord Ryoma practiced, but unpleasant and recursive spirals. Usually he had Kaze at least to pry it out of him. Kagero never bothered any more. Kagero had her own wells of absorption, as far as Saizo could tell. Now, without Kaze, he had even more to think about, and no purpose to which to turn it.

Lord Ryoma noticed. Early on Saizo had wondered if Lord Ryoma noticed everything about him--if he really was that transparent--but now it had occurred to him that Lord Ryoma wasn't all-knowing, merely curious; what he didn't understand, he was willing to ask. But there was a great deal he understood. "Saizo," he said to him one morning. "I would like to teach you to meditate. If it's something you're interested in."

"I am, Lord Ryoma," said Saizo. He didn't say, _everything you're interested in is something I'm interested in_. He thought it might sound ambivalent.

Saizo thought he understood meditation, or at least the shape of it--it was an occasional practice of the shinobi, to unify mind and body. In truth he'd never practiced it of his own volition. But when he sat across from Lord Ryoma, he found himself uncomfortable and observed, prickling under his skin: though he knew in his head that Lord Ryoma's eyes were closed as well. "I'm not--particularly good at this," he volunteered after a moment.

"Part of the exercise is accepting our own imperfection, Saizo," said Lord Ryoma. "We observe our minds drifting away to earthly concerns, and call them back as often as we must. Without judgment, and with patience for our own frustration."

Be that as it might, Saizo was fairly certain that his mind wasn't intended to go drifting as often as it did. After what felt like endless minutes of this, Lord Ryoma indicated that they should open their eyes, and then leaned forward to kiss Saizo on the forehead: "Good," he said, and Saizo offered a tentative smile.

Not everything Lord Ryoma taught him came so haltingly. Some things did. The very first time they were together, Saizo had tried to take all of Lord Ryoma's cock into his throat at once--and gagged, humiliatingly, and coughed with tears in his eyes, and Lord Ryoma had soothed him and stroked his hair and assured him that there was no rush. Since then Lord Ryoma had made a project of teaching him how, a little more every time, while Saizo tried to accustom himself to the taste and the foreign feeling against his palate. _Good_ , came Lord Ryoma's voice, and _mm. You're doing so well. But you mustn't be impatient. I have faith in you._

Words like that carried Saizo's confidence, when he was learning to do that: and when he was on his back and squirming and feeling like he wasn't ready fast enough, but also in zazen in the mornings when he practiced meditation. _I have faith in you._ It kept him centered.

Yet something was lacking: "Nothing is lacking," said Lord Ryoma, unhelpfully, when he brought it up; "You're learning. Be patient with yourself."

"It's not in my nature," Saizo blurted out. Then he clammed up in shame: that wasn't the sort of thing their relationship had room for. It was a breach.

But Lord Ryoma smiled at him and touched his face (and Saizo blushed, predictably), with much the same expression that he had when Saizo took instruction well. "Do you think that it's in mine?" he said.

* * *

Kaze's absence ate away at the hours of his sleep, though he didn't notice it until Kaze was back again: in a flash like that, back again, stumbling in to make his report to Lady Mikoto alongside the Flame Tribe woman he'd escaped with. Escaped--been freed. By stolen princess Corrin and the Nohrian lordling she called her brother, Leo. Kaze gave his account in a rush; Saizo tried not to stare. It was Corrin's mercy that had spared them, Corrin's softheartedness. Perhaps something of Corrin had survived the Nohrians, Kaze reasoned. And what of Prince Leo? Lady Mikoto wished to know; of Leo and Xander, Kaze couldn't say, save that perhaps they cared to spare Corrin's innocence.

 _Garon's sons are cruel adversaries_ , said Lord Ryoma, matter-of-fact at his mother's side. _And formidable commanders in their own right. But if they care for our sister, I suppose we can hope they've been kind to her._

To Saizo, the situation was an overwhelming mess beyond his comprehension. That was not unfamiliar. Standing guard, he often felt privy to decisions made far over his head. This time he was distracted by Kaze: a minor abrasion on his face, the slightest mar on his luminous features. He hadn't been well-treated by the Nohrians, but they hadn't tortured him, either. Perhaps they'd marked him for death too quickly. Yet here he was.

Saizo melted into the shadows as soon as he was permitted--Kagero glanced after him--and traced Kaze to his more comprehensive debriefing. Once that was finished, Kaze was left alone; and immediately he said, "Saizo? Are you there?"

It wasn't really a question. Saizo stepped into the light and took Kaze by the shoulders, as if to ascertain that he was solid. Kaze dropped his gaze, not expecting an embrace. He didn't receive one: Saizo just peered at him.

"I'm sorry," said Kaze. "I didn't mean to give you cause to worry about me."

Saizo reached up to brush the scrape on Kaze's brow with the backs of his fingers, not gently. "Did they question you?" he said.

"Briefly." Kaze turned his face to accommodate. "I didn't give them anything. They were just going to make an example out of us."

Saizo considered that. "Well," he said. "It seems they didn't manage."

"But for Lady Corrin," said Kaze with a brief smile.

"Don't be naive. Lady Corrin is a Nohrian now and Garon's sons have killed many more prisoners than this." The edge in Saizo's voice seemed to cut Kaze more deeply than he would have imagined; this only angered him to realize, for some reason, and he pressed on. "Good fortune spared you. Don't get into a position like that again. We can't afford to lose more people to the Nohrians."

"Yes, Saizo." Kaze looked stricken. Saizo remembered this expression from many angles and in many lights, never meeting his gaze, always looking away. He turned, teeth pressed into his lip under his mask.

* * *

" _The bush-clover dew, when I grasped it to thread it_ ," read Lord Ryoma aloud, " _like gems, it vanished. So if you want to see it, you must look at the branches._ " But instead of continuing, he stood and crossed the room to retrieve paper and a brush and inkwell. He sat back down cross-legged next to Saizo and lay the paper out. Saizo imagined he would set to writing; however, he reached over to touch Saizo's face, on the cheek just above the chin, and said, "Saizo. Come sit here."

Saizo grasped what he meant and moved to settle in his lap. He must have seemed shy, however, because Lord Ryoma tucked his arm around his waist, saying "It's all right," and kissed him on the back of the neck: which was counterproductive to his shyness, Saizo thought, but didn't say so. Once Saizo was still Lord Ryoma put the brush in his hand. "I would like it if you practiced your calligraphy," he said.

Saizo understood, or thought he understood, the purpose of calligraphy. Aside from beautifying the world, it promoted discipline. He understood discipline. But he had never had a particularly beautiful hand. He looked uncertainly at the penmanship in the anthology lying to one side; Lord Ryoma encouraged him, "Go on. Start with that poem." So Saizo held the brush as surely as he could manage and dipped it and put tip to paper.

He wrote the first few words of the poem-- _The bush-clover dew_ \--and was conscious of Lord Ryoma's arm around his waist and his hand, which was resting on Saizo's hip. As he formed the characters Lord Ryoma's hand wandered to rest flat on Saizo's stomach, through the fabric of his clothing. Saizo squirmed. "Shh," said Lord Ryoma.

The next words were shakier. _when I grasped it to thread it_ : Saizo was distracted by the press of Lord Ryoma's five fingers, and the potential that he might slip his hand under the fabric and touch him. But he didn't; he left it where it was, while the rate of Saizo's heart climbed, and he tried to remember the next line of the poem. He couldn't. His gaze transferred to the page where it was written. He was aware his breath had hitched.

He expected admonition from Lord Ryoma. But Lord Ryoma just shifted and murmured into Saizo's hair: "Do you know why we hone our penmanship, Saizo?"

 _Discipline_ , thought Saizo. _Excellence._ "I don't," he said, which came out more shortly than he intended. "Lord Ryoma?"

"It allows us to make our mark on others' thoughts," Lord Ryoma said, "and the world, even long after we've spoken the words and even if they are not our own. The scribe of these poems is not their author. They were authored hundreds of years ago," he mused, "and this is a third or fourth transcription. We express ourselves differently with every stroke of the pen. It is the longest-lasting echo of the voice." He kissed Saizo on the back of the neck again, almost absently. Saizo shivered. "I would hear your voice more often," Lord Ryoma said.

His hand moved; it pressed now against the bare hot skin of Saizo's waist. Saizo bit down a _please_ and stared at the paper. As if he'd heard it, Lord Ryoma said, "Finish the poem."

Saizo obeyed, shakily, and the letters were transferred to page. When he was done, he sat in silence while Lord Ryoma scrutinized his work over his shoulder. For a moment he wasn't sure of the character of his own nervousness. But Lord Ryoma smiled into his hair and nodded his approval; "Very good. You have a lovely hand," he said. And then he had mercy on Saizo, and turned him by the shoulder and kissed him and slipped his kimono down off his shoulders.

* * *

Lady Mikoto was gone. Saizo was away, and only learned of what had happened in whole after he returned; he was absent for all of it, for Princess Corrin's return and subsequent treason and Mikoto's death. A treacherous corner of his mind said that it was her retainers' fault that this had happened-- _happened to Lord Ryoma_ was the way that corner phrased it--that nothing like this would have happened if he and Kagero had been tasked to watch over her. The rest of him knew that was untrue, and that it was a betrayal of Lord Ryoma's lady mother to think so. But still there had been that instant.

Lord Ryoma was grim and red-eyed in mourning when Saizo met him again. Saizo had clearly missed the onslaught of his grief. He wasn't sure how to feel about that. The primary course of his thoughts was that he owed it to Lord Ryoma to be there when he needed him, for even the ugliness of his sorrow; but he wondered if Lord Ryoma preferred it this way instead, for a distance to be kept in accordance with their rank. That wasn't what Saizo _wanted_. He wanted Lord Ryoma to weep in front of him, if that was what was in his heart. But Saizo's desires were not important in this moment.

He and Kagero knelt in front of their liege. "It will be full-scale war with Garon," said Lord Ryoma. "Even if he weren't the architect of my mother's death, I believe he intends to invade soon. Our intelligence supports that much. I understand if you don't wish to be on the front lines of a conflict like this." He hesitated. "It's not the kind of battle that honors the shinobi."

Kagero raised her head. "Lord Ryoma," she said. "To go where you go is the only honor and privilege that we require."

"Very well." Lord Ryoma glanced over. "Saizo?"

Surprised that this was a question at all, Saizo stumbled over his answer; then again, he imagined Lord Ryoma would have considered it insulting to accept Kagero's answer to speak for both of them. "Yes, Lord Ryoma," he said, then realized that was unclear: "I will not leave your side."

It was not what he had intended to say. He lowered his head again and looked at the ground, but imagined that Kagero's eyes were boring into him. He heard Lord Ryoma say, "Stand, both of you," almost as an afterthought, and so he took to his feet, but didn't look up.

Once they were done discussing tactics, Lord Ryoma dismissed Kagero and said "Stay a moment, Saizo"; so Saizo remained where he was until Kagero slid the door shut behind her and Lord Ryoma touched the underside of Saizo's chin, tipping it up. "Look at me," he said gently.

Saizo looked up, with the absurd expectation of being chastised. He wasn't, of course; then he remembered the rule, and reached up to unhook his mask. "I'm going to send your brother to accompany Hinoka into the fight," said Lord Ryoma. "I'm sorry. I know you wouldn't like to be parted from him so soon after what happened to him."

"Kaze is a warrior of our clan," said Saizo at a volume that shocked himself, and possibly Lord Ryoma as well, for he raised his eyebrows at it--though smiled, a little, the first smile Saizo had seen out of him after what had happened to Mikoto. "He was raised for this. Please don't think that I worry about him."

"Of course you worry about him."

"Well, I mean, of course I _worry_ about him--" It was out of Saizo's mouth before he could reconsider it. He pinched his mouth shut. "I mean..." He wasn't sure what he meant. He let it go and looked away.

"You should speak with him," said Lord Ryoma. He phrased it as a suggestion.

* * *

There hadn't been a king in Hoshido in years. Everyone assumed that was about to change, but still Lord Ryoma delayed accession; _once the realm is safe again_ , he said, and the court whispered: _when is that?_ Saizo wondered, too: not because his pride cried out to serve a king, but because his heart wanted to see Lord Ryoma recognized for the service he had rendered Hoshido since he was a boy. He also followed a thread of selfish worry. The closer Lord Ryoma was to the throne, the sooner he would have to take a lady wife. This was something Saizo had laid out almost as many preparations for in his mind as he had for Kaze's funeral, and for even longer. Lord Ryoma was always going to marry. Saizo was always going to marry. He thought he had allotted sufficient space for mourning beforehand.

He didn't know what to feel. He did feel it, however, in a rush of emotion that clouded his thoughts and his kata; that upset him, as it always upset him to know he wasn't the master of himself in this regard. Kaze still called him impetuous. Kaze understood him better than any other.

Lord Ryoma touched Saizo's hairline, thumbed the nape of his neck. "Something is troubling you," he observed.

Saizo leaned back against him in his lap. It was still against his training and breeding, to do something like that--to rely on Lord Ryoma to support half his weight--but Lord Ryoma was intent on instructing him differently, and Saizo was his pupil. "There are many sources of trouble in our lives, Lord Ryoma," he said neutrally.

"Are you being evasive?" said Lord Ryoma.

Saizo colored. "No, Lord Ryoma," he said. "I just--" He _was_ being evasive. He colored further. But the truth was Lord Ryoma's due, so he thought about his words, and eventually blurted out, "I only wish to see you on your father's throne someday. I hope that we'll come to a peace with Nohr that will allow you to assume it sometime soon." Though a peace with Nohr was never quite how he had thought of it.

Lord Ryoma sighed: a small sigh, but nevertheless one that sounded like he was about to unburden himself. Saizo sat still and listened. Lord Ryoma said, "I thought it might be something like that. I--Saizo, I only wish to do honor to my mother."

He rarely spoke of Lady Mikoto. For him to do so was an admission enough by itself. Soon, he turned the topic again: "Is that all?" he said, gently.

It wasn't. Saizo squirmed, unwilling to refuse him and unsure what to say.

Lord Ryoma furrowed his brow. "Come here," he murmured; though this was rhetorical, as Saizo was in every respect already there, and Saizo turned to receive a kiss. "There's something I'd like to try with you. If you're amenable."

He was. The 'something' turned out to be difficult to describe--Lord Ryoma put his mouth on Saizo, like he did periodically when it suited him, but then he turned Saizo over and put his tongue inside of him, like Saizo was a woman, a feeling that made Saizo cry out in surprise into the bedclothes--and soon had him pleading for Lord Ryoma to have him, fully, which only yielded any results when he broke down completely and begged him to fuck him. Then Lord Ryoma bent him double and fucked him harder than he ever had, with a fury that Saizo didn't recognize: which he was too far gone to find frightening. He found that there were tears in his eyes.

When the last of his hoarse screams had been wrenched out of him, he was boneless and on his knees: and immediately embarrassed, thinking of Kagero. He expected Lord Ryoma to gather him up in his arms. Lord Ryoma didn't yet. He leaned down--he was still inside of him--and said again, quietly, "Is that all, Saizo?"

 _I don't want you to marry_ , Saizo thought in fragments. But when he tried to express that, the truth underneath surfaced, and he was saying, "I want to stay with you. Don't send me away."

Lord Ryoma exhaled; he levered himself off of him and sat up, and then leaned down to ruffle Saizo's hair. "You would never," he said at the breathless bottom of his voice, "be so easily rid of me, Saizo the Fifth." Then he did gather him up, and said in a murmur again, "Hush. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have treated you this way. --No, look at me. I would see your face. Your tears do you no dishonor." Saizo believed him.

* * *

He didn't have a first memory of Kaze. That bothered him sometimes, when Kaze was away and he occasioned to think of it. He had a few of Kaze crying, and many more of _himself_ crying in Kaze's presence, unfortunately, but nothing that conspicuously came first. Saizo knew his last memory of Kaze: they'd bowed to each other, the morning Kaze had been sent off with Lady Hinoka, and Saizo had given Kaze a bundle of onigiri. That had been awkward, and transparently on Lord Ryoma's prompting; they both knew it. Not that Lord Ryoma had told Saizo to give his brother food, exactly, but--he'd encouraged him to show his concern, and it had come out onigiri-shaped.

Saizo thought about the last time he'd kissed Kaze on the forehead. They'd been thirteen or fourteen. "Don't get yourself captured again," Saizo said now.

"I won't," said Kaze, and half-smiled at him; he was always smiling in parts when Saizo said things like that. Then he turned and went, and Saizo unconsciously committed his jawline to memory.

He had already gone to sleep alone when Kagero came to wake him; he turned over violently when she did, but he knew her voice and stilled and sat up. She lit a lamp. She was paper-white and there were hollows under her eyes. Sweat showed on her neck when she turned her head to avoid looking at him.

"Lord Ryoma?" he asked immediately, but he knew it was Kaze; what he didn't understand was the look on her face. She shook her head.

His hand came up and seized her by the wrist. This seemed to rouse her--she reached forward absently to pry his fingers off with a semblance of a warning glance, for whatever she'd come to say didn't license him to manhandle her. But it still took her a few moments longer to compose her reply. "It's Kaze," she said. "He's defected. There are several witnesses."

He had come awake immediately. What she said seemed to put him half back to sleep: or that was the way he felt about it, anyway. "To Nohr?" he asked, as if there was anywhere else to defect.

She nodded.

He looked away. Kagero said, "They say he's fallen in love with--"

"Lady Corrin. I know," Saizo said, because he did. He reached forward again: to take her by the hands, less roughly this time. "Does Lord Ryoma know?"

Kagero looked troubled before she answered, which was answer enough; still she said after a space, "Not yet."

He had never thought or assumed that she still preserved feeling in her heart towards him, after everything they had seen and done together. He didn't know what to do in the face of the contrary. What he felt didn't require much effort to name--it was gratitude, swollen, outsized. Saizo was left holding her hands. He glanced down. "We should tell him," he said. "I'll get dressed."

* * *

He didn't always understand Lord Ryoma's mind, which bothered him, because there was no reason he shouldn't; he had been presented to Lord Ryoma when he was still very small. Small and serious, according to Kagero, at moments when she was fond enough of him to tell him stories about himself, and he fond enough of her to listen to them. He didn't remember being serious. He remembered being shy. Lord Ryoma wasn't much older, after all, but he'd hit his first growth spurt already and he'd seemed older. The first words he'd ever addressed to Saizo were, _you're Saizo's son?_

Saizo had opened his mouth, which was dry. He'd coughed out: _Yes, Ryoma-sama._

 _You look like him_ , said Lord Ryoma, friendly; and then Lady Mikoto had gone back to talking.

It was an isolated memory, cut out from the others and strung on a chain, and together they didn't make very much sense. Such were the results when Saizo tried to piece together the scenes of his life without Kaze in them.

He slept next to Lord Ryoma on his side when they slept together, which was more and more often. He knew it meant Kagero had fewer nights off, and was ill at ease with that: not because it deprived Kagero of her time, but because it was like leaning on Kagero in Kaze's absence. He was conscious of that at all other times. He didn't want to become--there were no words for what he didn't want to become.

They sat together in silence more now, with Lord Ryoma's hand threaded sometimes through Saizo's hair. Whatever was troubling Lord Ryoma--the war, Lord Takumi's absences, Lady Corrin--he didn't speak of it. Saizo wanted him to: not just because it would signify faith in him, but because he'd always filled up his life with Lord Ryoma's burdens. They saved him the trouble of his own.

What Lord Ryoma did not do was touch him. Maybe he half understood Saizo's mind himself; only half, because he understood that Saizo didn't respond to him, the way he always responded. He didn't flush when Lord Ryoma's hand brushed the small of his back in the evening; he didn't shiver when he was kissed. So Lord Ryoma left him alone, and alone again, and Saizo was miserable and couldn't sleep. He was always tired the following days. Lord Ryoma fussed over him, and tried to get him to nap, but it was no use.

Eventually one night Lord Ryoma put out the lamp and kissed Saizo, and Saizo put his arms obediently around Lord Ryoma: relieved, because he knew Lord Ryoma understood the rest. It was an awkward and uncomfortable night, with more pain than Saizo had become used to--and he was content.

He dreamed about Kaze. He dreamed about bringing Kaze's body home from Nohr, in his arms. It was light and small: but that was all wrong, he was always remembering things wrong about Kaze. They were of an age. His mind always deceived him.

* * *

Something was wrong with Lord Takumi. No one spoke of it. Lord Ryoma certainly didn't, and Lady Hinoka and Lady Sakura only averted their eyes when their second brother came by, to the point that Saizo wondered if he was the only one who was sure of it. He wondered until he was sitting with Kagero and Kagero's friend Orochi--one of his least favorite pastimes, but sometimes it came up--while the women played a foreign board game with brown and white stone pieces. He looked up before they did, and the fletching of an arrow cut the air over Orochi's shoulder. Orochi let out a startled shout and dropped her gamepiece. Kagero was already on her feet, flat against a tree trunk.

There was trampling in the nearby brush. Then Lord Takumi emerged, carrying the Fujin Yumi, and a few moments after him a breathless and flustered-looking Hinata. Saizo stared at Lord Takumi, then tracked his gaze to a white bird which lay pierced by an arrow a dozen paces behind Orochi.

This was the point where Lord Ryoma would upbraid him for hunting in the palace grounds, for risking Orochi, for sheer carelessness with life. But Lord Ryoma wasn't here. No one had the authority to say anything to Lord Takumi. Usually, Lord Takumi was merely heedless of such things; now, however, he gave Saizo and Kagero a contemptuous look and then said, "Hinata. Retrieve the bird."

When they were gone again, Orochi was still breathing hard. "He isn't always like this," she said. "There's something wrong with him."

"Orochi--" Kagero raised a warning hand.

"It's _true._ "

They had no time to bring it up with Lord Ryoma. The following night Lord Ryoma didn't come to bed and Kagero didn't come back from patrol. He didn't interrupt Lord Ryoma in the war room, but he did look for Kagero, which was when the young shinobi from her patrol found him.

"They came out of nowhere," the boy was saying. "We had no idea--"

"Lady Corrin? The Nohrians?"

The boy was whitefaced.

Saizo shook him by the shoulders. "Who, then?"

He told Saizo. Saizo left; he sent the boy on with a message for Lord Ryoma, and he left.

* * *

Later, after everything: "I saw Kaze," he said to Lord Ryoma, on his knees next to Kagero in Lord Ryoma's quarters. They were both spattered with Kotaro's blood, but that interested Lord Ryoma less once he'd ascertained that it did not belong to either of them; when Saizo spoke up about Kaze, however, Lord Ryoma turned and regarded both of them mutely. Up until this moment he had been ready to discipline them both for the sequence of events that had taken them there, Saizo was aware: or at least to reprimand Saizo for running off against orders.

Kaze's name changed the expression on Lord Ryoma's face. "I see," he said. "What happened?"

"We had a mutual enemy," said Saizo with his gaze trained on the ground again. "I didn't think it would be the honorable time to take his life. It wasn't squeamishness. I won't stay my hand next time."

"Saizo--" Lord Ryoma made a noise that might've been the beginning of a sigh. "Never mind. Kagero, I'm glad that you're unharmed. You're free to go. Saizo, stand." She went, easy on her feet. When her footsteps died away--purely for Lord Ryoma's benefit--Lord Ryoma reached to touch a forming bruise on Saizo's face.

"Are you all right?" he said, low.

"It was a glancing blow, Lord Ryoma."

Lord Ryoma leaned forward to touch foreheads with him; then drew back to meet his gaze, saying nothing. He didn't need to: the subject of Kaze drifted to fill the room, like white smoke, until Saizo could not think of a place to look to avoid it. He said, in a voice more choked than he'd imagined, "I would not have rescued Kagero without him. Without the Nohrians. I--I'm sorry. I was in their debt. I could not have turned on him."

Lord Ryoma outlined the bruise again with his thumb. He said, softly: "Do you imagine that I am angry?"

"No, Lord Ryoma," said Saizo through his throat.

"Then what--"

"I am," Saizo burst out and was not surprised, though grimly humiliated, to find that he was crying; Lord Ryoma drew him into his arms as he went on, "I should have found a way. I should be rid of him."

"You only have one brother," said Lord Ryoma. But far from reassuring him, this only brought on another flood of tears. He was never beautiful when he wept, he was aware--not even as a child. It only rendered him red-faced and snotty and hoarse. He couldn't remember the last time he'd done so as a grown man; he had, once, as a teenager, pertaining to Kagero; and never in front of Lord Ryoma. But everything he did or was belonged to Lord Ryoma, and there was nothing left he could hide from him. So he sniffled into Lord Ryoma's shoulder and tried not to think of Kagero, again, hearing them.

After he was done they sat down together; and, hesitantly, Saizo started to undo his own obi. But Lord Ryoma held up a hand and gave the command, "No. That is not what I would have you do tonight, Saizo the Fifth."

Saizo waited.

"I would like to see your penmanship," said Lord Ryoma. They were not winning the war. He sounded tired; and for a moment Saizo thought he could hear the weight of unreachable burdens, of things Lord Ryoma understood that were far beyond Saizo's comprehension. He reached for the book and opened it to a verse. "Here."

 _Although it's autumn, there's no one weary of you,_ Saizo wrote: very carefully, clearing everything else from his mind. _O maidenflower -- so why do the colors shown on your face already grow pale?_

He sat in seiza when he was finished and held his work up for Lord Ryoma to inspect. Lord Ryoma did so. A smile illuminated his face, slowly end to end. "It's beautiful. You do yourself honor. Someday your son's son will read your work," he said, "and my son's son will have to think of more to teach him."

"Yes, Lord Ryoma," said Saizo, looking up at him.

* * *

When the time came, he willed himself to die--and he was wounded, so he thought it might be possible. Then he thought the Nohrians might kill him, but they did not. They tended to his wounds and Kagero's and eventually turned them loose with their weapons: for there was nothing left they could do, after all. She looked to him before they were freed, and he shook his head no; she looked to him after, too, and he said no this time out loud, and told her. She looked miserable to hear it. He was grateful that she did, at least, and guilty that he had ever doubted her. And then they had nothing but time.

They had already buried Lord Ryoma by the time Saizo and Kagero were healed and freed: buried him next to Lord Takumi, with a tall tombstone next to a shrine where the miko left offerings for him. He had a prince's funeral. He had never become king. Lady Hinoka was queen now--there were murmurs she was grieving not only for her brothers, but for her intentions to abdicate for Lord Takumi, before, which Saizo found difficult to fathom. There were other murmurs that she was grieving that she had to marry. Saizo wondered at the particular nature of that grief, and swore the retainer's oath once again.

Peace with Nohr, such as it was, meant less to do; and so he and Kagero walked to the graveyard of the royal family, and paid respects and offerings to Lord Sumeragi, Lady Mikoto, and Lord Takumi. She detached herself and motioned for him to go on to Lord Ryoma--but he took her sleeve again and glanced back at her, and they both went to see him.

Eventually the renewed closeness grew awkward again, and they went separately. When they chanced to run into each other, they looked at each other's offerings: "You brought flowers," Kagero said to Saizo.

"You brought food," Saizo observed.

"Well," said Kagero, raising her eyebrows: "you can never have enough food. Especially Lord Ryoma. He did eat a lot of food."

"He did not," said Saizo, slightly aghast.

"He certainly did."

They stood together for a time like that. Then Saizo thought they would depart again each for their tasks: but Kagero looked at him, inscrutable for a while, and then linked arms with him. He let her. Pity, he thought, was a powerful force. But that was misnaming what had happened, he supposed; and he turned and walked back with her.

* * *

After winter came and passed, Lady Hinoka went to visit the Nohrian court, and Saizo and Kagero with her: and he saw Kaze and his bride. It came as half a shock to him that Kaze had wed Lady Corrin after all, that his love had been more than passing delusion; but then again, he supposed it was in Kaze's nature as well as his, and that he shouldn't have doubted him. Kaze was paler now, in Nohrian weather, but older and, by some illusion, taller; and he regarded Saizo with wariness and a polite bow which only took his eyes off Saizo's for a moment's space.

They didn't have much time alone together. The peace was a distrustful one, and Kaze was called to his lady's side more often than not. But there were moments, in the dark (and ugly, in Saizo's estimation) Nohrian groves, when the royal parties were walking together and Kaze could have sought him out: but Kaze didn't.

Eventually Saizo found him. Lady Corrin was chattering with her brothers--her Nohrian brothers--and Saizo sat down next to Kaze. Kaze looked at him.

"Your wife seems healthy," said Saizo, at a loss. "I'll hope for a boy."

Kaze startled. "We'd love a girl just as well," he said. "Saizo?"

Saizo almost lost his nerve here, almost stood; but he held fast and said, "Hello, Kaze. It's--been a long time, hasn't it."

"Why?" said Kaze simply.

Saizo started on his words, choked on them, colored and looked down; then he supposed Kaze knew, but he spoke regardless in a low voice. "Lord Ryoma told us to continue our lives after he was gone," he said. "You were. --You are half of my life. You are free to reject me if you would like."

Kaze looked at him for a long moment; and in it Saizo could recognize a deep kind of bitterness, alongside something else. Not pity, either. His eyes tracked to Lady Corrin again: and then he said, "Come here, Saizo."

_It is the longest-lasting echo of the voice._

He did. Kaze wrapped his arms around him, heedless of onlookers. He murmured over his shoulder, "Saizo. Do you know you're a dreadful person?"

"I'm sorry," said Saizo, choking on what he realized with some bewilderment was a laugh--and also tears he couldn't afford to shed in front of Lady Hinoka and all the Nohrians. But Kaze put his fingers in his hair and hushed him, and Saizo wondered what else he was supposed to do.

**Author's Note:**

> Poetry cribbed from [this translation](http://lnhammer.livejournal.com/235960.html) of the Kokin Wakashū.


End file.
